Everybody, Stalfos
by 616
Summary: What belongs in the forest must stay in the forest. (OoT, Fado & Grog, Kokiri. Experimental.)


Fado is the oldest (besides Saria), even though all Kokiri are supposed to be the same age.

Fado is the oldest (besides Saria, but Saria doesn't count) and Fado has seen many things creepy and dangerous and bad. More than anyone besides Saria (who is special probably is what the wind whispers, doesn't count, doesn't count), or maybe Link, or the other the ones who left the forest when they weren't supposed to.

That final line of thought is one of very few things that can sour Fado's mood.

Though Link at least killed the Great Deku Tree so he _deserves_ it.

—

Fado is curious and unafraid by nature.

That does not change after the Deku Tree withers, leaves its woodland children alone and unprotected with only fairies that are even smaller and often more frightened than they.

So Fado perhaps solely does not worry about the monsters that begin to appear in Kokiri Forest as the years go by, even though they are many and the Kokiri are few. While the other children listen to Mido's orders to stay inside and hide away, cowering at the evil emanating from the faraway Sacred Meadow, Fado ignores her bossy tribe leader and the preying Deku Babas both, and wanders freely from the treetops of the village all the way to the Lost Woods as usual.

The Know-It-All Brothers remind her and each other and anyone that'll listen how dangerous it is to go about in the forest let alone the Lost Wood these days, just as they _used_ to say echoing the Great Deku Tree that any Kokiri that leave the forest die.

Leaving the forest is far worse, Fado is certain, so being worried more about monsters just means those brothers don't know so much at all, if anything. If they did then they would know that they should be just as scared inside their houses as she is out playing and having fun, because what the Deku Tree was too kind to tell them all is that Kokiri may not get old but they can die anywhere even in the forest, just like anybody else does when their time is up.

(Except Saria, but Saria doesn't count. Saria was there when Fado was the youngest. Saria will probably be there when the ones that born long after Fado dies are themselves getting picked off, losing their fairies or being careless and ending up lost in the woods or getting tired and deciding that the voices in the Sacred Meadow are calling because they're ready for company.)

Knowing what happens, Fado wanders the dirt roads between the children's houses at night. Meandering always toward the Lost Woods in the end though Mido will not let her pass a certain point where he says those things called Wolfos and Moblins gather.

Fado humors him and stays closer to the forest. She doesn't mind. Fado _is_ curious about ones called Stalfos, but for not-fun reasons, and Moblins are supposed to be gigantic but she knows what's in them probably tastes the same as the recovery hearts anyone can buy at the Kokiri goods shop.

She and her fairy have other fun things to explore in the meanwhile, because they are children and children must play.

Deku Babas snap their flytrap jaws for her torso only to be left chomping at empty air, when Fado skips over their spindly stalks like jump rope and laughs at them for thinking they can scare her. Her fairy Coda scolds and Fado makes him laugh and they speak only for one another, and everything is perfect.

The Deku Babas are especially fun because they turn into nuts or Deku Sticks when Fado kicks off their heads, and it reminds her of someone. That used to live in the forest with her and her friends.

She doesn't think about it or try to remember because Fado knows what happens.

—

It is not that Fado does not sense the difference or the danger that has come with the arrival of these many, new monsters in the absence of a guardian spirit or a Great Fairy to protect the forest.

Fado has lived long enough, and survived enough of things that others did not to know, like a secret friend, the whispers in her ears of evil winds that are blowing now from Saria's special place.

Fado listens to the sound of the fell wind under a sky that's always dark now and she giggles mischievously the way that makes any grown-ups fool enough to wander in get scared. Fado likes their fear and she likes sound that wind makes whistling through the trees, be it carrying the merry notes of Saria's Song, or death.

(The wind whispers sometimes thoughts of how maybe if she hadn't lost her caring, Fado could have been what Saria is. What exactly that means Fado isn't sure. She isn't sure she cares either, because Fado's just the oldest, not the oldest like _Saria_ —because somehow or other Fado will die like all Kokiri die, still a child, all of them still the forest's precious children who'll never leave it and that's all that matters to Fado because what belongs to the forest has to stay there.)

—

Whether the knowledge of how long she has lived is what fuels her meandering careless exploration or it's simply the same, maybe-selfish, gleeful whimsy that Fado has always possessed since she learned what happens to Kokiri when they leave the forest, it's not like anything is really _different_.

Even with the forest overrun. Even with the Kokiri Sword missing from its resting place, in the tribe's hour of need. With the Great Deku Tree, the father she had loved, withered and gone. All this comes to pass yet Fado knows that she realistically has little to fear from the forest.

She could get hurt. She could die. Kokiri do not age past childhood but they aren't special.

But, they are special. Not they, but the whole of them, the understanding that Kokiri are the only living species in Hyrule to have fairy guardians.

Because if Fado fell or were hurt or attacked, even killed, she has her fairy, who's watched over her since before she was aware of him—her precious Coda—to protect her. No matter what. The way Fado has seen other fairies die for Kokiri children she has known in ages past, giving up even their own lives to heal or save the forest's precious children only to leave those same kids all alone.

And Fado loves Coda. He's her best friend, and she's not scared of losing him, because once that happens then really nothing matters to Fado anymore. Because without Coda to guide her home through the Lost Woods Fado knows surely as she has seen that she will merely end up as another child doomed to wander the cursed woods forever.

And anyway, the Skull Kids are the only ones around here still dancing and having fun.


End file.
